


Holmes: The Inquiry

by bbcsherlockian



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Interviews, M/M, Self examination, Unconventional Format, Unrequited Love, in which sherlock interrogates himself and doesn't like what he finds
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-26
Updated: 2015-01-26
Packaged: 2018-03-09 04:48:41
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,009
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3236840
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bbcsherlockian/pseuds/bbcsherlockian
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>No dictaphone and no pencil. You sit and you watch yourself and you cannot deduce a thing.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Holmes: The Inquiry

An interviewer and an interviewee. One man. Yourself. You watch your own eyes flicker uncomfortably across the room. There is no need of any pen or paper. Sitting in the silence, everything watches you nonchalantly and yet you are alone.

_Would you like a glass of water?_

No.

_Anything?_

No.

_Are you comfortable?_

Marginally.

_Then I hope you don’t mind if we begin? Tight schedule._

(this is a lie.)

Not at all.

(a pause.)

_John Watson, your-_

_colleague,_

friend, yes.

_Friend, then. Close?_

I would hasten to say so, although my judgement of human connections and interactions have been widely discredited.

_Oh?_

Not my area.

_You’ve said that before._

How would you know?

(his eyes, piercing. they give the impression of scrutiny but his mouth and the angle of the head betrays his disengagement.)

_You answered it too quickly._

Regardless, not my area.

_Not your area._

Correct. I dislike repetition.

_How would you know?_

That I have no tolerance for the persistent litany that the majority of people conscribe to in their daily lives in order to conform to the sheer banality of existence?

_No. That “human connections and interactions” are not your area._

I have no experience of it.

_Exactly._

Ah.

(a longer pause. he drums the pads of his fingers against the armrest of his chair.)

_What is your stance, Mr Holmes, in regards to the truth?_

The truth.

_You repeated yourself._

Yes.

_Don’t feel pressured to answer. You don’t have to answer at all. You are not obligated to stay here._

Oh but I am, aren’t I?

_In a sense, I suppose. The truth?_

It is imperative. Necessary. The world would be hard-pressed to function without it.

_And yet?_

And yet to lie is the most important of all. Entertaining, individual, keeps us on our toes, keeps the planet turning. Keeps me in a job.

_Do you lie often?_

Yes, often enough. Although I find it mostly to be messy or tedious, and the lies I permit myself to relate are generally on a much more temporary basis. You create weaknesses for yourself otherwise. You have to fight to fill in the gaps.

_This established, do you give me your word that everything you tell me in this interview-_

Interrogation.

_-will be the truth?_

(he holds you, considers you with his eyes. you aren’t intimidated because he cannot deduce you. there is nothing more to know.)

Yes.

_Then we’ll start again, if you don’t mind._

I don’t.

_John Watson. Close?_

Yes, but-

_That’s fine. Have you ever had any romantic or sexual interaction with Dr. Watson?_

No.

_What do you value most highly?_

My mind.

_Do you take sugar in your tea?_

My coffee.

_How many cases have you failed to solve?_

Twenty-six.

_How do you sleep?_

Poorly.

_But how?_

On my right side.

_Do you like the rain?_

No.

_Showers or baths?_

Baths.

_Taxi or the tube?_

Taxi.

_Do you like the smell of wet grass?_

No.

_Do you prefer to forget rather than to remember?_

Yes.

_Would you consider yourself a ‘people person’?_

No.

_Do you like dangerous people?_

Yes.

_Do you like wearing socks?_

No.

_Have you ever killed someone?_

Yes.

_Do you care about money?_

No.

_Do you care about other things?_

Yes.

_Do you compose your own music?_

Yes.

_Do you like the south?_

Yes.

_Do you use escalators rather than lifts?_

Yes.

_Do you love him?_

Yes.

(this is too dangerous. no one heard. no one heard at all. this is far too dangerous.)

_Thank you, Mr Holmes. Now to go back to one of my earlier lines of questioning: could you please reiterate what you value most highly?_

My mind.

_Yes, you did say that._

I can remember. It wasn’t five minutes ago.

_Quite, but considering the breadth of content we have covered in the meantime… My apologies, for a moment there the superiority of your intelligence completely bypassed me._

Are you mocking me?

_Perhaps._

Do you believe me?

_Yes, but you should prove it._

Prove what, exactly?

_Your intelligence._

How?

_‘Deduce’ me._

I can’t.

_Why?_

You know why.

_For the record, Mr Holmes._

Because there is nothing about you that I cannot identify within myself. I cannot ‘deduce’ myself - as you so eloquently put it - because I would be inevitably biased, regardless of how highly I regard my own judgement of others.

_So you are flawed._

In a sense.

_You are your only flaw._

Not in my entirety.

_Your mind then, perhaps._

My mind is my only flaw?

_While also your greatest asset._

I see.

_Perhaps we should digress._

Perhaps, yes.

_Does he love you?_

No.

_How can you be sure?_

I can.

_But how?_

There is no definitive proof against the notion. But he doesn’t love me.

_So you can’t be sure._

I can’t be sure. But-

_But he doesn’t love you, I understand._

Thank you.

_A break. For tea?_

No.

_Alright. What do you value most highly?_

My mind. You’re a construct of it, you should know.

_I do know. What do you value most highly?_

My brain. My intelligence. I’m not entirely sure how else you want me to answer this.

_You’re doing fine. And you are still telling me the truth?_

Yes.

_To the fullest extent that you believe to be telling me the truth, anyway._

I don’t like what you’re implying.

_No one ever does. But what do you value most highly?_

My mind.

_What do you value most highly?_

My mind.

_What do you value most highly?_

My mind.

_What do you value most highly?_

(a pause. longer than any that has come before it and longer than any since. the size of the room fluctuates around him, eaten and spat out by its silences. his answer is so quiet it is almost swallowed by the walls.)

Him.

_Thank you, Mr Holmes. That will be all._

(the flat dims and twists and expectorates him out again so that he is - that you are - alone. the darkness soaks everything in basalt and the bare floorboards are textured against the soles of your feet.)


End file.
